It’s November 10th, 2016, and I have so many thoughts. Most of them aren’t suitable for this blog, but a few are pertinent and I feel the need to share.

If this election has taught me anything, it’s shown me that writers, artists, musicians, filmmakers, TV producers, and any and all creative types are more important today than ever before. Why? Because they are uniquely situated to impact popular culture in a way that staid politicians and other policy makers aren’t.

People’s views are molded— sometimes outright, sometimes subtly over time—by the media they consume. And in today’s world of instant access to all the media you could ever want, each of us as writers has an opportunity to shape society’s norms and standards in a meaningful way.

For example, I write romance. Stereotypically seen as the most frivolous, least impactful genre. But is it?

It commands the largest share of the fiction market by a wide margin. Millions of women (and a number of men) across the world read romance.

I’d say that’s a pretty big opportunity to make an impact.

As an author of romance, I can write inclusive characters that reflect our wonderfully diverse society. Because everyone, everyone, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, ability, or sexual orientation deserves a happily ever after. And by writing characters whom mainstream America currently views as “other,” maybe, just maybe, a reader won’t think of them as so “other” anymore. Maybe they’ll just be “people.”

I can craft relationships between equal partners. Portray women as self-sufficient, multi-faceted, driven, ambitious, and, oh yeah, they want to get the guy (or girl) too. And in the course of their relationships, they play an equally compelling role in the resolution. Not content to be mere damsels in distress or passive bystanders, these women are the masters of their own destinies, and they find partners who love them because of, not in spite of, their independent spirit.

I can write romance that empowers.

Okay, but what can one romance novel do? Perhaps not much on its own. But a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand?

Romance has the power to change the world.

So romance (and all) writers, keep penning those amazing, empowering, inclusive stories. Women make up slightly more than 50% of the population. When we start standing up and demanding better, what will the world look like? Let’s keep writing, and find out.